


Close To Gold

by saschsquatch



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dreamwalker Gabriel, Fanart, Illustrated, Lawyer Sam Winchester, M/M, fanart by osnaart
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-04
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-05-18 03:27:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14844794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saschsquatch/pseuds/saschsquatch
Summary: Sam Winchester knows that he's missing a lot of important things in his life. He never gets the interesting cases, so his job as a lawyer bores him, he doesn't have friends and failed to keep his connection after graduation from law school, and he permanently compares himself to his brother Dean, who not only has everything he could want but also a wonderful fiancé and a job he loves. Sam feels helpless and unable to change his life in a meaningful way, but one day that change comes all by itself in form of a dream and a golden feather on his pillowcase.





	1. Chapter 1

The purple morning sky looked as if someone had taken a broad watercolour brush and loosely painted thin, orange clouds across it without much care for accuracy, only for the wind to pick up quickly and chase them in front of the few faintly glimmering stars and the crescent moon. The pleasantly cool air wore a layer of citrus scent, giving off a feeling of strange peace if one forgot about the burning city of Babylon in the distance.

Sam tried to ignore the city as he sat in the pink grass and watched the sky and the clouds that ran across it like skittish animals. Stretching himself on the ground he took a deep breath, focusing on the picture above, trying to spot familiar shapes to distract himself.

The stress of Sam’s everyday life followed him to this place, looming far away even when he rested in the soft grass, all time in the world to take a nap or roll around or do whatever he pleased. Even with the peace of the gentle wind that combed through the little daisies and dandelions, Sam couldn’t shake the feeling of an unknown impending dread. He inhaled and closed his eyes, concentrating on the here and now.

Gravity suddenly shifted in the space next to Sam, pulled him closer and tainted the air with a vague scent of cotton candy. He opened his eyes only a slit wide, his eyelashes covering most of his vision, but he could see the man that sat down to his right. The morning light kissed his mud-blond hair in a halo and made him stand out from his surroundings, as if he didn’t fully belong to this place. Sam propped himself up on his elbows to take a closer look.

“Enjoying the view, Sammy?” the man hummed with a nonchalant smirk curling the corners of his lips.

“It’s… Sam,” he replied flustered. Sam had assumed that he was all alone by himself, not noticing anyone on the vast fields of pink grass that spread in all directions over the hills, but now there was suddenly someone with him.

“Sure.” The man shrugged. “How long have you been waiting?”

“Waiting?” Sam asked. He wasn’t aware that he’d been waiting for anything, or was he? Did he wait out an upcoming disaster, the flames of the city spreading into the fields on the hill? Was he anticipating this unstable peace to end? What even made him so certain that it couldn’t be just that? Peace that was just peace and didn’t have to crumble into chaos?

“I know you’re not just here to take a nap, Sammy,” the man commented, gazing at Sam with his eerie eyes. They had a strange colour, a brownish gold, reminding him of sunlight shining through a glass of whiskey. Sam would remember them.

“Why am I here then?” Sam wanted to know, sitting up as he suddenly became interested, but the man just gave him a rough chuckle.

“How would I know?” he murmured, the tone of his voice telling Sam that there was something he didn’t say.

“I guess,” Sam replied, squinting his eyes as he inspected the man closer. While Sam wore his normal flannel and jeans, his feet bare without shoes, the man next to him was clothed in an old-fashioned white robe, as if someone had taken him out of ancient times. “Who are you?”

The man looked out into the distance, his elbows resting loosely on his knees as he scratched his chin with one hand. “Gabriel. They call me Gabriel.”

“Gabriel?” Sam repeated, the name leaving an unfamiliar taste on his tongue, “Why are you here?”

“Well, why are you?” Gabriel asked back with a smirk that confused Sam. The blond man had been here for only a few minutes and already made more questions than Sam knew to answer.

“I… just said I don’t know…” he replied, a bewildered look on his face.

Gabriel shrugged. “Yeah. Me too, I guess.”

They quietly sat together, but Sam somehow felt awkward in the presence of another person. He had tried to relax on his own, separated from the rest of the world for just as much time as he had to spare in an attempt of letting go of his troubles, but now that Gabriel was with him that didn’t feel possibly anymore. The blond man was an interruption of Sam’s voluntary solitude.

“You’re uneasy, Sam,” Gabriel noticed after some minutes of discomforting silence. Sam gave him a look, watching as the wind tousled Gabriel’s hair in all directions. The morning sun rose slowly above the treetops of the nearby forest, changing the sky’s colour from purple to a warm petrol green and painting the man next to Sam in the same shade.

“Not really,” Sam muttered in response as he averted his gaze, “Or maybe I always am.”

“I know how that can be,” Gabriel replied, his golden eyes flickering to Sam for a moment. “I mean, I don’t really, at least not anymore. Don’t got much to worry about myself, but I can understand how you feel. Stress at work?”

“A bit.” Sam shrugged.

“Hm.” Gabriel looked away as if he didn’t have the right words for the situation, but didn’t want their conversation to die out just yet. Then suddenly he rose up from his place in the grass, peeking over his shoulder to give Sam a smirk. “C’mon, let’s go for a walk.”

“Uhm…” Sam considered the offer. He felt like he would prefer to be alone, but then again Gabriel seemed like a strange person and maybe they would never meet again after this, so why not give it a shot? “All right,” Sam added, dragging himself up to follow Gabriel to wherever the man was wandering off to.

They walked in silence, but somehow things felt different now. Maybe it was that they weren’t sitting anymore and actually doing something wasn’t as awkward, but Sam felt a lot more at ease with Gabriel and himself. Although strolling over a field with a stranger was nothing Sam had ever done before, it reminded him of his childhood when Dean used to play catch and ball games with him on late afternoons after school. Dean had always been taller and faster and stronger than his younger brother, at least until Sam’s growth spurt in senior high.

“You’ve been here before?” Sam asked, looking around. He almost couldn’t see the city anymore, glimmering with tall flames in the far distance like a little star that wanted Sam’s attention, but for some reason he simply didn’t care when they walked further and the image faded like a chalk drawing under the rain.

“Oh you know,” the other man hummed, the hem of his robe fluttering as the wind picked up and swirled through the blond strands of his hair. “I’m more of a people person than a places person, if you know what I mean.”

“Not at all,” Sam laughed briefly when they arrived at the edge of the forest, leaving the grassy hill behind.

Gabriel chuckled and sent Sam a wide, toothy grin. “I don’t care too much about location, it’s more about the company to me.”

Sam nodded understandingly. “I guess I get that,” he replied, following Gabriel into the woods.

When Sam crossed the first line of trees, he suddenly found himself in a busy café where waiters rushed between countless of tables, serving hot beverages to the faceless, babbling customers sitting comfortably in their chairs. The ceiling was weirdly high for such a place, holding orange and yellow paper lanterns that hovered on long strings above the crowd, painting the scene in an eerie light. The doors silently fell shut behind Sam and when he looked outside through the windows, he couldn’t tell whether it was just incredibly dark or there wasn’t anything beyond this café at all. Only his faint reflection looked back at him and the forest had vanished.

“C’mon,” Gabriel said, taking Sam out of his thoughts and giving him no time to contemplate about the sudden change of scenery.

They crossed hundreds of occupied tables with laughing and chatting guests sitting around them, each filled with more food and delicious drinks than the last, before Gabriel finally found a place for them to sit by the window. The rain was drumming a relentless rhythm against the glass, letting no light through that could’ve told Sam anything about the outside of the café. Maybe it wasn’t important, but he wondered what he could find beyond the blurry image of water droplets bombarding the window. It was storming.

“So, what’s bothering you, Sammich?” Gabriel asked, folding his hands on the table as he pulled Sam’s attention towards him. He gave Sam a gentle smile, emitting an aura of warm reliability.

“I dunno,” Sam mumbled, his gaze directed at his fingers that impatiently tapped onto the surface of the table top. There wasn’t any specific thing that bothered him in particular, it was more the general feeling of the direction his life was headed in. Sam found himself unable to form a direct thought regarding the issue, not knowing how to properly put his experiences into words.

Before Gabriel answered, a faceless waiter appeared at their table. He didn’t say anything, didn’t even greet politely, and placed hot drinks in front of them before he left quickly and Sam realised that they hadn’t even ordered yet. When he inspected his hot beverage, he was surprised to see that the foamy Latte Macchiato was exactly what he had in mind. Gabriel, on the other hand, had a steaming mug of deliciously smelling hot chocolate, the heavy, sweet scent wafting in Sam’s direction.

Gabriel took a sip, licking slowly over his thin lips. “You’re dissatisfied.”

Sam could only nod in response, playing with his spoon in an attempt not to stare too much. The voices of the other patrons and the rain outside were fading into the background quickly, and all that was left to hear was the slow jazz music playing from the live band in one of the corners of the café.

“Ever thought about changing something? New hobby, new place to live, new friends? Girlfriend, boyfriend?”

Sam snorted, sipping his Latte. “I should change something, but that’s not as easy as it sounds.”

“I mean, at least you’re working out,” Gabriel hummed, his gaze dropping to Sam’s chest. “Looking good.”

“You’re flirting now?” Sam raised a playful eyebrow, not really in the mood for conversations like that, but he could tell that Gabriel’s concern was genuine and his comment was just a joke.

“Nah,” Gabriel huffed, giving Sam a smile. He tapped his spoon on the table and suddenly it filled up with all kinds of delicious sweets, fancy pastries with mountains of powdered sugar, pies and cakes and bowls of whipped cream.

Sam’s eyes widened as he saw the spectacle unfold in front of him. “How did you do that?” he asked, watching Gabriel dip his spoon into the whipped cream and guide it to his mouth.

“Magic,” the man replied, wiggling his fingertips at Sam, suddenly making him realise that he knew nothing about Gabriel, not who he was nor where he came from or what he did for a living. He didn’t even ask for his last name.

“You know…” Gabriel murmured, picking up a whole pie with one hand, looking at it intently before he shoved the entire thing into his mouth at once. Sam couldn’t even comprehend what happened. “You shouldn’t pay attention to unusual things when you’re dreaming,” Gabriel said, and with that he suddenly vanished, together with the decorated table and the noisey café and the rain outside. Sam’s vision went dark.

When Sam opened his eyes slowly, he found himself in his bed like every morning. He stretched and took a gaze at his alarm clock, showing him 6.34 a.m. in bold green digits on the display and promising at least twenty more minutes of sleep, but Sam was aware that after a dream like this, he wouldn’t find another moment of peace. With that in mind he sat up on his memory foam mattress, ready to go to the kitchen and start the coffee maker before he had to jump under the shower.

But just as Sam wanted get up, he found a small, golden feather on the pillow next to him, reminding him of a certain pair of golden eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

Back when Sam was a child, he used to have the wildest dreams at night, how he’d ride on giant, eight-legged animals through the sky or swim in the ocean to discover long lost treasures. When the morning came he wanted to tell his dad, but John never had much time or interest for the things Sam came up with at night. Dean always listened patiently and when he wasn’t around, Sam would draw pictures and write little stories, never really good ones, but it was enough for him to be creative. Sometimes John put his drawings on the fridge, but usually Dean was the one who demanded them to be displayed in the kitchen. Sam didn’t mind as long as someone listened and cared.

Over the years Sam forgot about the dreams he used to have. As a child almost every night was filled with vivid pictures and stories, sometimes only colours and shapes, sometimes the wildest experiences he couldn’t even describe when he was awake, but always something. As Sam grew older, more and more nights became just sleep, dreamless unconsciousness until the morning light or usually his alarm clock woke him up. Nighttime used to be his favourite and every day when Sam went to bed he’d anticipate the next dream his mind could come up with, but things changed as Sam got older. 

Nowadays dreams were a rare thing for Samuel Winchester. After his father died a year ago, nightmares became a regular thing and shortly before he got his law degree a few years back he had a bunch of bad dreams telling him he’d never pass and had to start over. When stress at work became overwhelming, Sam almost never found good sleep at night, often rolling over in bed, chasing a minute of shut eye but only finding horrid images that woke him up drenched in cold sweat. Good dreams… Now those were a rarity.

In reality there wasn’t much time for a freshly baked lawyer to dream, since there wasn’t much time for Sam to sleep either, burning through nights of unpaid internships with too much work fueled by more coffee than a human being should consume. Once Sam finally got a stable position at a respectable law office he got some of the sleep back and with that a few more comfortable dreams, telling him of the love and fulfillment he hadn’t found in his waking life yet.

Sam knew he shouldn’t compare himself to Dean, after all the older brother had four whole years on him and a lot more experience. But Dean… Dean shared a big apartment with his boyfriend Castiel whom he had known since high school, he got a stable job at eighteen at Bobby’s garage, he had a car and money and basically everything one could wish for. The wedding was already in planning and kids would follow quickly, Sam was sure of that. Meanwhile Sam’s last date had been back in law school and until he got a paid job, he had shared an apartment with three other guys he barely knew, just to be able to pay the rent. Now he was a successful graduate and had work probably until the end of his days, but everything else was missing. Sam contemplated on getting a dog, just to feel less lonely.

Sam had expendable income, but buying a new flat screen TV and nice things for his kitchen didn’t make him happy and he feared that getting a pet wouldn’t help either. What lacked in his life were real friends and meaningful relationships. He liked his job as a lawyer, but sometimes his work brought more stress than happiness into his life. It was hard to know what really went wrong with him, but some mornings Sam woke up with a deep hole in his chest and without anything to fill it with.

Even after last night’s strange dream, Sam did what he did every morning. He presses the button on his expensive coffee maker and went into the bathroom, brushing his teeth under the shower while foaming his special shampoo and conditioner into his hair. Although he did this every weekday over and over again, this wasn’t a routine Sam was sick of yet. He liked to shower every morning and to have a calm breakfast afterwards with a podcast playing in the back, but as he sat on his kitchen table and ate a piece of toast, he again felt like something was missing. Sam had enjoyed to be by himself ever since his childhood, but now the loneliness gnawed on him, taunted him with questions he didn’t want to answer. Why was there no one in his life who spend his mornings with him? Was it his fault, hadn’t he tried enough to find that special someone?

During his entire morning Sam couldn’t get his dream out of his mind. It made him uneasy not to know what it all was about, what the locations meant and most importantly who Gabriel was. Sam had read somewhere on the internet that faces you saw in your dreams were always someone you had seen in real life before. Maybe that wasn’t true, but it seemed plausible to Sam that his brain didn’t just come up with those. 

Whatever his dream meant, Sam now had this strange golden feather that reminded him too much of Gabriel‘s eyes. It was a stupid thought to assume that the man he had met in his dreams left it on his pillow, but Sam liked to think that was the case. No matter what was true, the feather was certainly nice to look at, so Sam would keep it.

Once he had cleaned his plate in the sink, he checked the kitchen clock and after a few minutes he already grabbed his bag, slipped into the sleeves of his light jacket, and left through the door to get the bus in time. He really should buy a car soon.

Half an hour later Sam arrived at his workplace. The office was on third floor, but Sam never took the elevator, feeling that he should at least take the stairs. His work hours only gave him the option to go to the gym on weekends and although Sam went out to run every other evening, he didn’t want to miss any additional exercise. He could at least do this for his body, knowing that sitting in an office all day couldn’t be healthy.

Sam greeted his secretary Charlie on his way in and hung his jacket by the door, booting up his computer as soon as he sat down. There were a few cases he had to manage, nothing critical, but lots of paperwork. Sam sighed as he saw how much he still had to do. The mountain of work he had rarely got thinner, and once in a while Charlie came in to add to it.

As Sam began to work, he found himself distracted by his dream again and again. It just didn’t want to get out of his head, the conversation with Gabriel that didn’t really go anywhere, but still left him puzzled. Sam rarely had weird dreams, he almost never dreamed at all and if he did, it was usually nightmares. The one tonight was different though. Gabriel felt so… real. People in dreams never feel that way, not having any actual agency, but Gabriel didn’t seem like he belonged. Maybe Sam shouldn’t overthink it. It was just his imagination running wild, but somehow he had to replay the events in his mind over and over again.

“So, what’s the mood today?” Charlie chimed as she walked through Sam’s door, placed a steaming mug of coffee on his desk and rested her hip against the wooden edge.

Sam chuckled and took a sip. “You’re an angel, Charlie,” he laughed with a wide smile for his secretary. He didn’t know if they were really friends, but she was probably one of the closest things Sam had to that. “Not much. Had some weird dreams last night.”

“Yeah, I know how that is,” she replied, “Sometimes I eat a whole lot before going to bed and then I just dream crazy stuff. Or when I watch three entire seasons of a show until three in the morning, I can’t get that out of my mind either when I sleep.”

Sam shook his head, an amused smirk on his lips. “No, it’s not like that. I never do that. And I usually don’t dream either…”

“So what was it about?” Charlie asked, pushing a bit of paperwork aside so she could sit on the desk’s surface. “Was it a nightmare?”

“No, not really,” Sam muttered, his eyes flickering over his computer screen. Work could wait. If Charlie showed interest to talk, he shouldn’t turn her down. “So, I was sitting on a pink field and there was a city burning in the distance.”

“Oh god, was it Lawrence?” Charlie asked, clearly engaged in the story already.

“No, I… I don’t think so,” Sam replied as he tried to remember the details. “I don’t know anymore. It’s not important anyway. So there’s this guy who sits down next to me, Gabriel, and he has those beautiful, golden eyes.”

Charlie nodded, her wavy red hair swinging with the motion. “And? You’re crushing on the literal dream guy?”

Sam shook his head, but he couldn’t help a chuckle. “Not really. Anyway, we have some small talk and then he wants to go for a walk with me, so we’re walking to a forest, but as soon as we enter through the trees, we’re suddenly in a huge café! It was so surreal.”

Charlie gave Sam an amused smile. “Yeah, that’s what dreams are like usually. Doesn’t sound so bad though. Do you know this Gabriel guy?“

“Not in real life. I didn’t know who he was, but somehow he magically made stuff appear on our table and he shoved an entire pie into his mouth before he disappeared and I woke up. And I found this golden feather on my pillow…” Sam reached for his wallet in his suit pants and took out the feather to show it to Charlie. “And that’s exactly the colour of his eyes, I swear.”

“All right, that’s weird,” Charlie agreed as she inspected the feather between her thumb and index finger. “If there’s no golden birds living with you.”

“Nah,” Sam chuckled, taking the feather back to stuff it carefully into his wallet. “So yeah, I can’t stop thinking about him.”

Charlie’s eyes glimmered and Sam knew how invested in his story she was. “Who knows?” she said, “Maybe you’ll see him again in your dreams? If you do, you definitely gotta tell me!”

Sam gave her a wide smile. “Sure, if you tell me about your weird “I ate too much the night before” dreams in the future too.”

“Deal!” Charlie replied, nodding enthusiastically. “So, what d’you say, we’re grabbing lunch together?”

“Sounds perfect. But I really should get to work or Amara’s gonna rip off my head.”

“Oh yeah, bosses can be fierce, and she’s unfortunately no exception,” Charlie laughed, twirling her red curls, “All right, I should make some calls now.”

Charlie threw him another smile and left through the door to his office. Sam looked after her and sighed before he took his coffee mug and went back to work. Maybe Charlie could be the friend he needed, at least she was always in a good mood and cared for what Sam had to say. Getting lunch with her wasn’t so bad either. Maybe they should make some plans for a weekend some time in the future.

While Sam was buried deep in his paperwork, filled out forms on his computer and did more research on his cases, he could never fully chase Gabriel out of his thoughts. Maybe Charlie was right and he’d dream about the man again, but for now he tried hard to concentrate on different things. Dreams were nothing that should interfere with his work.


	3. Chapter 3

Sam found himself on the back of a giant, seven-headed snake that drifted through the algae green cosmos, stars spilling from its tail like blood from a paper cut. Opalescent, glassy scales the size of manholes spread in both directions away from Sam’s feet, glittering as if a little fire was burning inside of each, illuminating them internally.

Sam easily could have stayed in that place and watch the galaxies pass by, see the moons and planets spin around each other and their mother stars in an endless cycle. There was something relaxing about simply standing still on the back of a colossal animal while it travelled the universe. Sam payed attention to both his own body, his breathing and the rhythm of his heartbeat, and his unfathomable surroundings of the endless green void that held an occasional solar system or asteroids so much smaller and slower than the snake that time seemed to stop for them.

The only reason why Sam finally decided to move was that the snake approached an immense star slowly dying out in a boiling supernova and the heat became more and more unbearable with each minute. Sam needed shelter. Luckily for him, he could spot a small forest growing on the snake’s scales somewhere in the distance, so he began to walk in that direction to look for shade. 

The star felt burning hot on Sam’s back, drenching him in his own sweat under his flannel until Sam came to the point where he took the shirt off and wrapped it loosely around his waist. The walk to the forest took longer than he expected, and although he was utterly exhausted from the heat, he sprinted the last hundred meters just to get into the shadow of the trees.

Fortunately the temperatures in the forest turned out to be more comfortable, not really cool, but endurable enough to let Sam breathe for a moment, resting against the bark of a tree before he walked further into the woods.

The flora and fauna were growing around him, different coloured mosses and fungi sprouted out of the ground and covered the trunk of every tree. Little blue insects crawled into the heads of flowers that grew between the moss, and Sam was careful not to step on anything. He walked for a while before he found a place that was unlike everything in the forest, where a clearing opened between the trees and in the middle of it, Sam found a small wooden cottage. The last thing he expected to find here was a shack, but Sam decided that he wanted to take a look.

He opened the door and took a step inside, but once he had entered, the door fell shut behind him. Sam looked around, realising that he was now wearing his old brown hoodie from college times, a piece of clothing that he had missed ever since graduation. The inside of the shack was cluttered with all kinds of things, different decorations of glass and marble covered the surfaces of old wooden cupboards and every space on the walls was hidden under paintings and pictures and dozens of wall clocks.

“Ah, Sammy, I was wondering when you’d turn up,” he heard Gabriel’s warm voice, spotting the man by the table in the middle of the room, “Tea’s just ready.”

While Sam watched Gabriel pour tea from a fancy pot into two porcelain cups, he suddenly became aware that he was dreaming. If Gabriel was here, this couldn’t be real.

Sam sat down on one of the wooden chairs, giving Gabriel a curious look. The man sent him an honest smile, his golden eyes shimmering as if he had been waiting for this. He pushed one of the filled cups in Sam’s direction.

“This is a dream, isn’t it?” Sam asked while inspecting his tea. It smelled like strawberry and vanilla to him.

Gabriel nodded, sitting down next to him. “Yes, of course. Did you think any of this was real?“ He made a wide gesture around himself, making Sam not only notice their clattered surroundings yet again, but also that Gabriel was dressed in a soft jumper and sweatpants this time.

“Are you real?” Sam asked almost instinctively as he reached for his tea and took a sip.

Gabriel gave him a satisfied smile. “Any reason to believe a madman in a dream?”

“Well, you seem pretty aware about this dream thing,” Sam commented.

Gabriel shook his head, the smile still resting on his lips. “Let’s say I’m more real than any of this here, but I’m less real than you. If you believe in something like degrees of realness.”

“So is this your home?” Sam asked curiously, his gaze wandering around.

“This? Oh no,” Gabriel chuckled, “This is all you, Sambo. The snake, the forest, this cottage…” He leaned forward and gently tapped his middle finger against Sam’s forehead, “All up in here. As I said, you’re dreaming.”

“So why are you back here? In my dreams?” Sam wanted to know as he nibbled on his teacup in thought. Maybe he imagined Gabriel again because he felt lonely or needed something interesting. There was no doubt that the guy was just another figment of Sam’s nighttime imagination.

“Oh, I’ve visited you before once, when you were little,” Gabriel hummed. He snapped his fingers and both of them suddenly had a plate with a piece of chocolate cake. “And I gotta say, Sammy, you used to dream a lot crazier.”

“I was a crazy kid.” Sam shrugged. Gabriel was right, he used to dream more as a child, a lot more frequently and vivid. This here almost felt like old times.

“And now you’re a boring adult?” Gabriel laughed as he began to eat his cake.

“I’m a normal adult,” Sam sighed. He looked down into his teacup as if he could find the answers to his everyday life melancholy in there. “I just don’t have a lot to dream about…”

“Hm, well, that’s why I’m here,” Gabriel replied and casually leaned back in his chair, crossing one leg over the other. “To help your little head out, make you dream. Some people need a bit of inspiration.”

Gabriel’s gaze fell to one of the clocks on the wall next to them, but Sam didn’t know what it told him. All the clocks showed different times.

“Seems like you gotta go,” Gabriel said, putting down his tea cup. “Nice talk, Sammy.”

“Wait, why do I need to go?” Sam asked, but just as he had said this a loud ringing went through the cottage. It only got louder and louder, so much so that Sam pressed his hands to his ears to drown it out, but it didn’t help. Gabriel gave him a golden-eyed smile and suddenly vanished.

A moment later Sam hit the button on top of his alarm clock with his palm, pressing snooze for five more minutes. He groaned tiredly and rubbed his face. God, he just wanted a bit of time with Gabriel, but at least he had met the man again. It had been over a week since the first dream with him and Sam almost lost hope that he’d see him again, but as it turned out, Gabriel was willing to visit more often. Or rather, Sam’s dreams imagined him again, most likely because he felt lonely in real life.

When Sam rolled to his side to wrap himself tighter in his blanket, his gaze fell onto the thing next to him on the pillow. Another golden feather. Sam reached for it, puzzled by its mere existence. Did Gabriel leave it here? No, that couldn’t be.

When Sam came into his office that morning, Charlie was expectedly excited to hear about his dream and the additional feather he found once he woke up. She insisted that it meant Gabriel was real, but Sam shook his head with an amused laugh, knowing that it was impossible. He wanted to believe it, but at the same time Sam was aware of how crazy this sounded. Maybe he should check his pillows for golden feather fillings.

Work was rather boring and Sam found himself distracted by too many thoughts about the man of his dreams, but at least Amara promised him an interesting case soon. Sam was still new at the company and therefore got the work other people didn’t want, wishing for his lunch break to begin soon.

Sam had promised to meet Castiel for lunch at a nearby diner. With the good relationship he had to his soon-to-be brother-in-law, he was always happy to spend time with him. Sam often visited Castiel and Dean at their apartment for shared family dinners on weekends, but he couldn’t help being a little bit jealous whenever he was reminded of how well their life was going. Not only would they marry soon, they also had dozens of friends that would celebrate with them. Sam on the other hand barely had a good connection to his secretary and that was about it. Everything he missed was something Dean and Castiel had.

“Are you bringing someone with you to the wedding?” Castiel asked, chewing on a steak fry.

“Huh?” Sam looked up when Castiel pulled him out of his thoughts.

“If you are bringing anyone to our wedding, Sam,” Castiel chuckled, shaking his head. The man was always way too patient with Sam, and as one of his only friends he seemed to understand him quite well. Sam didn’t know how Castiel and his brother fit together, but they were happy with each other and to Sam that was all that counted for that matter.

“Oh, uh, I was thinking about bringing Charlie.” Sam shrugged, impaling a piece of tomato on his fork.

Castiel lifted his eyebrows. “Charlie? You are dating someone?” 

“No. No, Charlie’s just a friend,” Sam muttered, wishing that he was dating anyone, but that was something he could only dream about at the moment. “I don’t think she’s like that.”

“Like that?” Castiel gave him a confused look, “Anyway, you should tell me when you know. I need to plan everything and I already feel like there’s not enough time.”

“Isn’t Dean helping you?” Sam asked as he ate his salad.

Castiel sighed and rested his elbow on the surface of the table. “He tries. But you know how he is, there’s always work at the garage and I understand that he’s stressed when he comes home. He’s doing all he can.”

Sam nodded, giving his future brother-in-law a sympathetic smile. “Yeah, I get that. Planning an event isn’t easy.”

“Tell me about it,” Castiel groaned. The rings under his eyes told how much sleep he got lately. “Anyway, what about you, Sam? I do not want talk too much about myself and my problems.”

“Ugh, I dunno,” Sam mumbled, shoving the lettuce leaves in his bowl around. “I feel like I should get a dog or go back to therapy, but I have no idea how to fit either in my schedule.”

“Therapy? What’s wrong?” Castiel asked. Sam felt like he shouldn’t give him additional things to worry about when he was already buried in stress thanks to the upcoming wedding, but Castiel was one of the very few people he could really talk to.

“Nothing really…” he sighed, “I just feel incomplete. I like my work, but I get so many minor cases that I don’t feel like I’m ever doing anything worthwhile. I don’t got the time for a real hobby and I don’t really have friends. You know what I mean?”

“Yes, of course,” Castiel replied with a nod. “You should have just said so. If you want to, Dean and I can take you along when we are spending time with our friends. Maybe you would enjoy that.”

Sam gave Castiel a thankful smile. “That sounds good,” he said, even if he didn’t feel that way. Dean and Castiel’s friends were mostly couples reaching thirty or older, and whenever Sam was with them, all he did was feeling out of place. That was exactly why he considered taking Charlie with him to the wedding, just so he wouldn’t have to sit all by himself without anyone to talk to.

Sam thought that maybe he would find friends of his own eventually. Maybe if he got closer to Charlie, they could spend more time. Whatever happened, Sam knew he had to change something about his life. Get a hobby, do things he liked, build the relationships he needed. He could do it, but in the meantime there was another thing that still occupied his mind. Gabriel.


	4. Chapter 4

Sam’s office wasn’t the most exciting place. He had a wooden desk that was always covered in at least two mountains of paperwork, a fairly new computer that still didn’t always do what Sam wanted and several irremovable coffee stains. On the wall behind his chair was a shelf where he collected all the files of his cases in a neat order, since his boss would probably snap his neck with her bare hands if the folders weren’t easy to find, although she rarely ever needed one of his. Besides that there wasn’t much else, a dustbin in the corner and two windows whose roller blinds were drawn shut at the moment, because every afternoon the sun came in and blinded Sam during his work.

His job was the easiest when Sam was fully emerged in it and his mind went into autopilot, so he could drown out the noises of the birds and the traffic outside and his own fingers as they pressed into the keyboard of his computer and produced a loud clicking sound. Once in a while Charlie would come in to bring news from their boss or a new folder with additional paperwork, or if Sam was really lucky a mug of coffee and a conversation.

Sam liked his job. He liked working on cases, he liked spending time in the office and with Charlie. He also got a good paycheck, which was a plus. What really bothered him was when he only got the minor, inconsequential work that could be done without any thought and just through dragging, mind-numbing labour. He didn’t like the hours either. Sam was a concentrated worker, but eight whole hours plus overtime every weekday simply was too much. Sam couldn’t imagine anything he would have fun doing for eight hours, and so he usually spent the last two hours with counting the minutes until he could go home. 

Sam found himself in that minute-counting phase of his workday right now, only an hour leave, or maybe an hour and a half depending on how much he got done, just that he rarely made any progress when he was already so exhausted. His mind drifted off to nothing in particular, but as his eyes snapped back to the big clock on the wall, he could swear it was ticking backwards. Sam felt like he was going back in time, having more work instead of less with every passing moment, but he often felt that way. The problem wasn’t the work itself, it was the sheer amount of it.

Sam decided to watch the clock, just for a minute, as he realised that the second hand was missing. Didn’t this clock usually have a hand that counted seconds or did Sam just imagine that? It couldn’t just disappear, could it? But as Sam was staring at the ticking piece of glass and plastic, asking himself what was ticking there if not the missing hand, suddenly the minute hand of it went in the wrong direction. Sam blinked. Was this clock broken? He turned his head to check the time on his computer, but when he clicked the little symbol in the corner of his desktop, he could slowly watch the seconds moving backwards. Time was going in the wrong direction, instead of getting closer to the end of his workday, Sam was moving back to the beginning. He couldn’t start all over now, he already felt too exhausted!

“Whatcha doing, Sammich?” he heard a familiar voice as the door to his office fell open and Sam saw Gabriel walking inside with his hands stuffed in his pockets, chewing on the stick of a lollipop. 

“Gabriel!” Sam breathed out as he got up from his chair, grateful for the rescue from his own mind that seemed to be drifting into insanity with every minute of work that came back.

Gabriel took a careful look around the office before he stepped up to Sam and pulled him into a quick hug, patting his back. “That’s what you’re dreaming about?” he chuckled, kicking playfully against Sam’s desk, “Work?”

Sam took a moment, gazing questioningly into Gabriel’s golden eyes, before he realised what the man was talking about. Of course. Gabriel wasn’t real, so if he was here, that meant Sam was dreaming. He wasn’t at work and time wasn’t moving backwards either.

Gabriel flopped down on Sam’s desk, pushing a pile of paperwork onto the ground where the floor opened up a hole and ate all the papers that were falling into it. Gabriel tossed his lollipop stick into it before it closed again and there was only the floor left. “How are you doing, Sammy?” he asked with a soft smile.

Sam shrugged, resting himself against the edge of his desk next to Gabriel. “Currently having a nightmare about work, I guess. So I’m probably overworked.”

“Maybe work less, if it messes with your head so much?” Gabriel suggested.

Sam snorted. “Ah yes, the magical solution of “just working less”, how could I forget about that? Gabe, no offence, but I got a working contract and I’m not really in a position where I can simply walk up to my boss and ask her for fewer hours.”

“Well, if there’s one thing I never understood about you humans,” Gabriel replied casually, “It’s your obsession with work and your bosses.“

Sam raised an eyebrow, unsure what to think of this statement. Why did Gabriel know so little about how the world worked? “It’s because we gotta work so we don’t starve, you know. I can’t live without money.”

“Ah.” Gabriel scratched his cheek. “Well, that sucks.”

Sam couldn’t help but laugh, smiling brightly at the other man. “You could say so. But I like my work, really. Once I get more interesting things to do, I bet it’s gonna be better.”

Gabriel’s lips quirked into a compassionate smile and he gave Sam a slow nod, his golden eyes sparkling. “If your life isn’t hella exciting at the moment, how about I show you some cool stuff here in your dreams?”

Sam knew that there was no one else like Gabriel in his dreams, not even in his real life, no one who interested him as much. If Sam had the opportunity to spend time with him, he would follow him anywhere. The promise of Gabriel showing him “cool stuff” was something Sam couldn’t say no to. 

“Sure.” Sam shrugged casually, as if it didn’t make his heart beat faster, his whole chest tighten. He wished Gabriel would visit him more often.

The blond man gave him a wide grin and jumped from the desk. He walked over to the window and grabbed the blind, pulling it up to the top and even further, until he had created a doorway into a white nothingness behind it. The glass of the window was gone and Gabriel smoothly stepped through. With a smirk he wiggled his eyebrows at Sam. “C’mon, Sambino, you can’t let me wait all the time.”

Sam laughed, following behind him with an excited smile and a pulse that pounded too fast in his veins. Once he had stepped through the window, it quickly closed behind him and Sam found himself in an emptiness where nothing existed except for him and Gabriel.

“So,” Gabriel purred, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his suit pants. He had the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to the elbows, revealing the naked skin of his forearms. “What do you see?”

Sam looked around, but he didn’t spot what Gabriel was talking about. There wasn’t anything here. “Uh… Nothing?” he guessed.

“Exactly!” Gabriel replied in an excited tone, clapping his palms together. “So, watch this,” he said and held a hand in front of himself. A few tiny blue flames spurted from his fingertips and a moment later a tree grew out of the white ground in front of them. It slowly gained height and its trunk became thicker, until Gabriel took his hand away and a fully grown oak occupied the space where there had been nothing but whiteness just a second ago.

“Wow,” Sam said, inspecting the tree. He walked closer to it to touch its bark, but it was solid. Almost real, if Sam ignored that he was still in a dream. “That’s impressive.”

“Sure,” Gabriel replied with a smile of pure self-satisfaction, “I can do so much more, Sammy. But now it’s your turn, you try.”

“Try what?” Sam asked, giving Gabriel an unsure look.

“Making stuff. This is your dream, Sammy,” Gabriel insisted, “You can do whatever you want. It’s easy.”

Sam walked back to the other man, confused as to what he was talking about. It made sense, in a way. This was a dream and Sam was aware of it, so he should be able to alter it, too.

“How do I do it?” he asked, looking at his fingers. “How do I do the blue flames thing?”

Gabriel made a dismissive gesture and shook his head. “I do the flames just to look cool, don’t bother yourself with it right now. Just focus on creating something.”

“Uh, okay,” Sam mumbled. It looked easy when Gabriel did it, so casual and yes, the flames made it cool, but now that Sam was supposed to make something, his head was empty. 

Gabriel softly placed his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Just relax. This is your dream, remember? You’re the God here. Start with something small.”

Sam nodded with a thankful smile for Gabriel. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine something, alter the fibre of the empty place they stood in. Something small, something like… flowers. Sam thought of their colour, white daisies and yellow dandelions between green grass, a small patch sprouting from his feet. When he opened his eyes, the grass and flowers grew in all directions, so far that there was nothing white left on the ground. Sam blinked a few times, puzzled that he could create so much. The sky was still white, but it only needed a thought for Sam to fill it with the colours of the sunset.

“Perfect,” Gabriel said proudly as he gave Sam a wide smile, his golden eyes sparkling excitedly. “You’re a natural. You don’t wanna know how long other people need to learn all this.”

“Other people?” Sam asked curiously. Gabriel was a part of his personal dreams, he didn’t talk to other people.

“Eh, nevermind,” Gabriel chuckled and sat down in the shadow of the oak tree he had made. He patted the space next to him and sent Sam a playful smirk, encouraging him to get down into the grass with him. “C’mon, Sammy.”

Sam walked over to the blond man and sat by his side before he suddenly had a strange idea. This was a dream and Sam had been polite and reserved towards Gabriel, never breaking their personal space like he would do in real life, but this was his world and he had wanted to touch Gabriel this whole time. He could do that, he could do anything.

Sam lowered his head into Gabriel’s lap, cuddling up to him until he felt his warmth, facing Gabriel’s stomach as Sam lay on his side. It felt… good. Welcome. And suddenly Sam didn’t feel so tense anymore, asking himself why he hadn’t done this before. There were no consequences, right?

Gabriel let out a small, surprised noise at Sam’s intimate action, but then his chest vibrated with a low chuckle and he slid a careful hand into Sam’s hair. “Someone’s touch starved,” he hummed playfully, but Sam knew that he was just teasing.

“I just don’t get too much of it,” Sam sighed, pulling his legs closer to enjoy Gabriel’s warm aura. He leaned into the touch of his fingertips on his scalp, savouring every moment of it.

“Sammy, you know I want you to be happy,” Gabriel said, his hand combing soothingly through Sam’s hair, “I hope your life starts to fulfil you soon.”

“I just need someone like you,” Sam mumbled in response and closed his eyes. “Someone I can talk to, someone I really like… Someone I can touch.”

Gabriel laughed, and although Sam didn’t look up to him, he could feel the bright smile on his lips. “You could always ask Dean to talk. Or for a hug, you know. He’s your brother.”

“That’s different…” Sam replied as he began to play with the hem of Gabriel’s shirt.

“Is it?” Gabriel asked, “I mean, I know what you’re saying. But you shouldn’t think that only a romantic relationship can be an intimate one. That Charlie girl? She’s your friend, treat her like one.”

Sam squinted, tilting his head to look into Gabriel’s golden eyes. “When did I even tell you about Dean and Charlie?”

Prompted by that, Gabriel chuckled a wholehearted laugh, his body buzzing with energy. “Sammy, I’m in your head. I may not know everything about you, but the people closest to you? It’s like their names are written on your forehead.”

Sam rested his head back in Gabriel’s lap, sighing happily. “I guess so… You’re probably right. I should spend more time with them.”

“You should,” Gabriel said with a smirk, “But for now you’re mine.”

Sam chuckled, nodding in agreement. “Yeah. But I’m enjoying that a lot.”

“Is that so?” Gabriel asked, but his voice carried nothing like surprise. It was like he had expected this, but then again he was in Sam’s head “I guess then you wouldn’t mind if I came over more often? Say, every other dream?”

Sam gave him an honest smile, shifting to lie on his back in order to look up to Gabriel more easily. “Gabe, I’m always waiting for you. I’d be glad if you were with me in every of my dreams.”

“Ah well,” Gabriel hummed, softly sweeping one of Sam’s hair strands out of his face to tug it behind his ear. “Then I’ll be happy to visit more often.”


	5. Chapter 5

Gabriel’s visits suddenly became normal. Whenever Sam went to bed, or even just had a thirty-minute nap, he could be sure that the blond man was waiting for him in the strangest of dream locations. Somehow it felt… good. Sam had someone to rely on, a real friend he could be with every time he closed his eyes to sleep. 

Over the weeks of shared dreams Sam felt like their relationship slowly became more intimate, always greeting each other with a hug and sometimes they were just lying somewhere, rolled together to cuddle, giving Sam the touch he didn’t get enough of in real life. Sam considered making the next move, just kissing Gabriel at some point, but when he realised that Gabriel maybe wasn’t as unreal as he first thought, Sam became more reserved.

Sam was developing a crush. Or maybe he had always felt this way for Gabriel, the man with the power over dreams who had shown Sam how to manipulate them himself. He was always nonchalant and charming, flirting with Sam casually as if it wasn’t a big deal. It probably wasn’t. Sam knew he should make a move eventually, aware that Gabriel was just giving him the time he needed, but he was still nervous. Touching Gabriel, cuddling with him, it all felt so natural and good, but Sam couldn’t bring himself to finally kiss him yet. He would do it soon. He could do it.

What really made Sam think that Gabriel could perhaps be real were the feathers. No dream with Gabriel passed without a golden feather that Sam found next to him once he woke up and given how many nights he had been with the other man, he now had a big glass jar full of them. It couldn’t be a coincidence anymore. It didn’t even matter where Sam was, even if he stayed with Dean or had a movie night at Charlie‘s apartment, the feathers came consistently if he had seen Gabriel in his dreams during his sleep. Gabriel must have been the one who left them.

Charlie was the only one who knew about it. Sam had told her in the beginning and she was excited enough to always ask for updates, and since she quickly rose to the status of Sam‘s best friend, he simply had to tell her about it. He gave her the details about cuddling and holding hands in his dreams, about the feathers and his crush on Gabriel. If Sam couldn’t fully believe that the man was real, Charlie definitely believed it. Sam knew that it would’ve been weird to tell anyone else that there was someone like that in his dreams, but Charlie fully encouraged it. Sam could be glad that she was so open minded.

One day in the office she suddenly pulled out a huge book, letting it fall onto Sam’s desk with a loud thud.

“What’s that?” Sam raised an eyebrow, gazing at the tome. It looked big and old, and had a red leather cover with different symbols etched into it. 

Charlie leaned against his desk with a self-satisfied smile and crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Book on dreamwalker myths in all kinds of different cultures,” she explained, flipping it open so Sam could read the calligraphy title “Dreams and the ones who visit them - a collection”. 

“Looks older than it is,” Charlie added with a smirk, “It’s from the sixties, but apparently the author wanted it to look authentic. Anyway, it’s a pretty comprehensive collection on dreamwalkers and I thought your Gabriel might be one of them.”

“How did you get this?” Sam asked with big eyes. Was Charlie really so invested in his dreams? There wasn’t any doubt left on that now, was there?

“My cousin works at a big library and he has some connections, so I asked him.” She shrugged casually, downplaying the issue as much as she could.

“Thanks,” Sam breathed out, honestly grateful about this. Maybe it would tell him a thing or two about Gabriel. “What do you want for it?”

Charlie gave him a wide grin as if she’d only been waiting for this. “I want all the details. If Gabriel confesses that he’s a dreamwalker, you tell me.”

Sam snorted, nodding with an amused smile on his lips. He should’ve expected it. “I’d tell you anyway, Charlie. Thank you.”

 

When Sam came home that night after work, the first thing he did was making some tea so he could enjoy reading the book on his couch, possibly finding out more about Gabriel. He had already flipped through the pages at work and tried to get a bit of info, but his job was his priority and so he mostly had to focus on his cases instead. Now that he was curled in a blanket in his living room, a steaming mug on his coffee table, he could finally relax and see if there was something helpful hidden behind this leather cover.

Of course not everything in the book could be true for Gabriel. Maybe nothing was, maybe Gabriel was something completely different. Most of these myths couldn’t be much more than fairytales and Sam would have never believed that anything like a dreamwalker could even exist, but now he had the proof collected in a glass jar on his bedside table.

Sam read until late into the night when he already felt his eyes falling shut, but the book was a thousand pages thick and he knew he wouldn’t be able to get it all into his head today. The stories were interesting and Sam liked to see how different cultures treated the dreamwalkers. Some saw them as reapers who took their loved ones in their sleep, having the ability to kill whoever they visited at night. Other cultures worshipped them as Gods of sleep and healing as they knew how to shape dreams and give humans control over themselves while they slept. Apparently most myths included that the dreamwalkers had their own realms, sometimes called kingdoms by certain cultures, and that those could be separated into different spheres. 

Sam didn’t know how useful most of this was to him and his own dreamwalker issue, but then he suddenly found a page that described the myth of a dream bird. Of course Gabriel wasn’t a bird, but he always left a golden feather behind when he visited Sam, and that was consistent with the tale described here. 

“You really shouldn’t stay up that late, Sammy.”

Sam found himself sitting in a closed compartment of an old train, the scenery quickly passing by outside of the window. They were driving in the valley next to a mountain and Sam could see the train tracks winding around the hill in smooth serpentines. On top of the mountain Sam could spot a cathedral plagued by a storm, lightning and heavy rain, but it would take a few more hours before they were arriving up there.

The compartment itself was comfortable and spacy, with soft red leather seats and a grid hanging above them where they could store their luggage. Gabriel sat in front of Sam, dressed in an expensive, crimson coloured satin suit, smirking at him casually.

“I fell asleep, didn’t I?” Sam groaned, hoping he would wake up in time not to miss work tomorrow. He didn’t even know how late it was when he dozed off on the couch. He’d probably have some bad back pain in the morning.

“Yep,” Gabriel chuckled, getting up from his seat to slip next to Sam, wrapping an arm around him to pull him closer. Although they cuddled every other dream these days, it still surprised Sam how close and intimate the gesture was. God, he really was starved for affection.

“Wanna tell me what you were reading?” Gabriel hummed, caressing Sam’s shoulder with his fingertips. Sam melted into the touch, forgetting for a moment that Gabriel had even asked something.

When Sam became aware that he should answer, he wondered how Gabriel could know that he’d been reading before bed, but the man was in his head after all. “Did some research about you,” Sam admitted, but he felt like he’d just been discovered at doing something he wasn’t supposed to.

Gabriel laughed an amused chuckle, his golden eyes glowing brightly. Sam couldn’t stop thinking about how beautiful Gabriel was like that. “Wanna share with the class what you found out?” he wanted to know.

“I guess… You’re a dreamwalker? Does that make sense?” Sam answered truthfully, “I don’t even know what to believe, honestly…”

“Yeah, dreamwalker is about right,” Gabriel hummed. It surprised Sam to get this info so easily, but then again Gabriel never really hid anything from him. He just enjoyed to keep an aura of mystery.

“So you’re real? Really real?” Sam asked with wide eyes, unbelieving that he had found the truth. 

“Yup,” Gabriel chuckled. It wasn’t a big deal to him. It was just what he was and he didn’t seem bothered that Sam had found out, but to Sam this was something huge. A few months ago he didn’t even believe in anything supernatural, but now he knew that the guy he had a crush on was a real dreamwalker.

Sam looked outside to watch the bypassing trees and patches of grass that grew on the mountain, contemplating on the things he had just learned. Gabriel was real. He actually existed, which meant that technically Sam could be with him. If Gabriel wanted that, too. Maybe that was a crazy idea though. Yes, Sam had feelings for him, and even if the tiny chance existed that Gabriel felt so too, he still wasn't even human. He was someone Sam could only meet in his dreams. He could never introduce him to Dean or have a white-picket-fence family life with him. Even if Sam was with him here, he’d never have him when he was awake.

But was that any different than a relationship with a human? If Sam dated someone else, he couldn’t spend time with them when he slept. With Gabriel it was the other way around. Was it really that bad to consider being with him?

“Anything else you’re burning to find out?” Gabriel hummed. His hand slipped lower to Sam’s side, squeezing it. “I’m an open book. But we can also talk about this another time, if you don’t feel like it anymore.”

“No, no. I wanna know some stuff, but I didn’t exactly write down questions,” Sam laughed, giving the dreamwalker a wide smile. He cuddled a bit closer to him, enjoying the energy and warmth Gabriel’s body radiated. “How old are you?”

“Well, I don’t think you can measure my age in human years,” Gabriel answered, “Time in dreams works differently. Sometimes a few seconds can melt into hours, and vice versa. So I really can’t know either. A few eons? Who knows.”

Sam nodded understandingly. An almost immortal being who had decided to spend time just with him alone. It felt… special. Sam’s chest filled with a comfortable warmth, one that was so enveloping and welcoming that he wanted to stay in it forever, just savouring the bliss of Gabriel’s presence and his attention.

“You could go anywhere,” Sam suddenly realised.

“Any dream I want.” Gabriel shrugged. “And I also got my own place. I go there when you’re not asleep.”

“But you’re with me? Every time I go to sleep?” Sam asked with wide eyes, unable to understand Gabriel’s reasons, “Why?”

Gabriel smirked, a playful glow glimmering in his golden eyes. “Because I want to. Because I like you and there’s no human I’d rather be with.”

Sam stared at the dreamwalker, his baffled mind racing, trying to put together the pieces Gabriel just presented him. He liked him. Wanted to spend all his time with him, just as Sam was always looking forward to falling asleep, just so he could see Gabriel. Somehow it made sense. 

All of a sudden Sam wasn’t thinking anymore, unable to stop himself from leaning in to press a careful, unsure kiss to Gabriel’s lips.

A small gasp of surprise left Gabriel’s half-opened mouth, but then he leaned into the kiss and chuckled lowly. He wrapped his arms around Sam’s neck to pull him closer, his tongue slipping out to taste Sam’s soft lips. 

Sam’s body was buzzing with warm electricity as he realised what he was doing, a shiver going through his spine. He was actually doing it, he was making a move with Gabriel. A dreamwalker. He was kissing a dreamwalker, one who felt more than pleasant in his arms.

“You know how long I’ve been waiting for this, Winchester?” Gabriel murmured once he broke the kiss, just a few inches separating their faces so he could gaze up to Sam, his golden eyes glowing with a mischievous light.

“Sorry to let you wait, not gonna happen again,” Sam chuckled, his chest feeling light with joy as if he had a little sun warming him up from the inside. He just wanted to hug Gabriel and never let go of him, nuzzling his head into the crook of his neck.

“I better hope so,” Gabriel hummed happily, “You won’t get rid of me so easily now.”


	6. Chapter 6

“You want me to come to your brother’s wedding with you?” Charlie had asked, leaning back in her chair. She was Sam’s best friend and still Sam had been nervously standing there with his hands shaking by his sides. He wasn’t asking her out, he just needed someone with him. “You... do know that I’m a lesbian, right?”

Sam startled. Of course he knew, because barely a day passed without Charlie swooning over another girl. “No, no! That’s not what this is about! It’s not a date, I, I just don’t wanna go alone and you’re my best friend,” he stammered. 

“Yeah I know, I’m just playing with you. I know you’re dating Gabriel.” Charlie grinned brightly at him, showing her teeth. “Calm down, why are you so nervous?”

Sam breathed a sigh of relief, smiling while he shook his head in disbelief that Charlie would tease him like this. “I don’t know, asking people to a wedding is just weird. I didn’t want you to misunderstand it. I know you’re into girls and I got Gabriel.”

“It’s fine,” she said with an understanding smile. She absentmindedly balanced one of the office pencils on her fingertip. “I’d be nervous too. I’ve got no idea how to ask someone out.”

“Aw,” Sam chuckled, “You’ll find someone eventually. You’re sweet.”

Charlie grinned widely at him. “Yeah. I know. I just wanted you to say it out loud.”

Sam snorted, shaking his head yet again. “All right, thank you, Charlie.”

“No problem,” she hummed, “C’mon, get back to work, or Amara’s gonna come over to kick your head off your shoulders.”

 

Now Sam was getting ready for the wedding that would begin in a few hours. He adjusted the tie of his black suit and pushed his fingers through his hair, checking himself in the mirror. No matter how nervous he was or how stressful work became, thanks to Gabriel every night was filled with the best sleep Sam ever had. He didn’t have to complain about dark circles under his eyes anymore, thankfully.

Since Castiel was raised Christian, he insisted on a wedding in a church, but Dean didn’t seem to mind. They had done the paperwork at the civil registry office this morning, so legally they counted as married already, but that wasn’t real to them without a ceremony and their friends to celebrate. Sam could very well understand that sentiment.

“Do I look okay?” was the first thing Dean greeted him with when Sam arrived with Charlie at the church. Dean was shaking visibly, clearly nervous and uncomfortable in the white suit he and Cas had picked out for him. He had put some gel in his hair.

“Yeah Dean, you’re perfect,” Sam reassured him with a smile. “Really, don’t be nervous. It’s gonna be fine.”

Charlie gave Dean a thumbs up. “I guess you two wanna be alone right now?” she asked, quick to pick up the signs, “I’ll go sit down then.”

“She looks nice,” Dean commented as they watched Charlie disappear into the church room where the ceremony was going to be held in a moment. “You’re dating?”

Sam shook his head. “No, but she’s my best friend. We’re not interested in each other, it’s fine.”

“Huh.” Dean looked down on himself, tugging on his white tie. “I hate this thing. I can’t breathe.”

“It’s gonna be fine, Dean. You look great. Just imagine how much Cas likes you in that outfit, isn’t that worth it?” Sam offered with a smile for his brother. 

“Yeah,” Dean sighed deeply, “It totally, absolutely is. I love that bastard.”

“That’s why you’re getting married,” Sam snorted. “All right, you wanna hand me the rings?”

Dean nodded, pulling the little box with the rings out of his pocket. He quickly checked if they were still in it - of course they were - and handed it to Sam. “We got like five minutes left. Cas is already waiting inside.”

“You wanna use these five minutes to breathe and calm down?” Sam offered.

“That’s easier said than done, Sammy!” Dean whined, pushing his fingers into his hair. “Aw shit,” he sighed, looking at the gel on his hand.

“Wait, it’s all right,” Sam reassured him and pulled a pack of tissues out of the inside pocket of his suit jacket. He handed one to Dean to clean his fingers and fixed his hair while he did that. “C’mon, it’s gonna be fine.”

“I hope so,” Dean muttered, visibly unconvinced.

Sam pulled his brother into a tight hug and patted his back. Maybe he couldn’t make him less nervous with words, but he could try to give him an aura of calmness. “You got this, Dean,” he told his brother, “And afterwards you’re married to the person you love the most. Isn’t that worth it?”

“I love you the most,” Dean mumbled.

“I’m willing to share my place with Cas,” Sam said with a wide grin as he broke the hug, his hands placed reassuringly on Dean’s shoulders. “We should go inside, c’mon.”

Dean swallowed before he nodded slowly. He knew that it was time and that he shouldn’t let Castiel wait any longer. Together they pushed open the door to the church room, family and friends already sitting in the rows. Sam could spot Bobby and Crowley placed on the first bench, behind them Jo, Ellen and Ash. There were dozens of people Sam didn’t know and Charlie had taken her place somewhere between them. As they slowly walked in, all of them rose from their seats.

Castiel stood by the altar, wearing a white suit similar to Dean’s. He couldn’t hold back a wide grin as he watched his soon-to-be husband approach together with Sam, and a sheen of tears collected in his blue eyes. Sam’s throat began to tighten as he realised how indescribably happy he was for his brother and Castiel, who had become a great friend to him over the years. Things weren’t always easy for these two, but everyone could see how fortunate they were with each other and how well they belonged together. They deserved a great wedding and an even better marriage. Sam had no doubts that they would manage just fine.

Sam stepped to the side behind his brother when they arrived by the altar next to Castiel and the priest who would hold the ceremony. For a moment Dean and Castiel had eyes only for each other as Castiel instinctively reached out to his fiancé’s face, stroking his thumb over his cheek. Dean gave him sappy smile, before the priest cleared his throat in order to get their attention, telling everyone that they could sit down now and inviting them to pray with him for the couple that was about to be married.

Sam could barely focus on what the priest was talking about as he moved on with the ceremony, congratulating Dean and Castiel on their relationship and wishing them the best for their marriage. All he could concentrate on was his brother’s lovestruck smile, how he looked at his fiancé with so much gratefulness in his gaze, and Sam realised the sob he quickly swallowed in his throat. He already had tears in his eyes. 

When the priest told them to exchange their vows, Dean reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, pulling out the notes he had made for this. He swallowed, skimming through the lines of handwriting before he gave Castiel a smile. “Cas, I… I never thought the apple pie and white picket fence life could be something for me, but you successfully changed my mind on that. Already in middle school I thought I’d never make it to twenty-five, that this wasn’t what’s right for me,” he inhaled, looking at his writing, “But when I met you, these things suddenly changed. You’ve been my best friend since high school and you’ve always been my anchor, the one who kept me sane and most of the time the one who also kept me healthy and held me back from becoming self-destructive. I don’t know who I would be without you, but I certainly wouldn’t be as happy as I am. And that also means that I want to give the same back to you, to make you feel loved and to keep you safe. Forever. I want to give you the happy life that I thought I couldn’t even have for myself, but you showed me that I can. I know that I can have anything I need as long as I am with you. I love you, Cas.”

By this point, Castiel was crying mercilessly and without shame. Sam had trouble holding his own tears back, fumbling in his pocket for the package of tissues he’d taken with him for this occasion. He handed one to Castiel, watching as he violently blew his nose into it.

Once Castiel had taken a deep breath and collected himself, he took out his own notes. “Dean, I want to start with the most important thing to say,” he swallowed a sob, “I love you. Back in high school, this was just a crush, one I thought I could hide. I couldn’t, I never could, because you are the person I always wanted. And, and as we grew older, my love for you only grew bigger until… Well, you know what happened.” Castiel paused, smiling shyly, his blue eyes sparkling with tears. “I would’ve never come so far without you. You pulled me through all-nighters at college and made my degree possible, you helped me with my depression and all those anxieties I still had in high school, and now you’re helping me with the biggest step in my life so far. Because I’ve never done anything as important as what we are doing today. Today I want to promise you the rest of my life, to share it with you no matter what happens. I hope I can be the husband you deserve, Love.”

Dean reached out to hold Castiel’s hands tightly, his whole body shaking. Both of them were crying now, and Sam’s chest was full with warm love for those two. His ribs were pressing against his lungs and made it hard to breathe properly as swirls of emotions filled him up.

The priest finally asked them to exchange their rings, so Sam searched for the little satin box to hand it to his brother. Castiel and Dean both took one of the rings, trembling as they slipped them onto the other’s finger. Dean chuckled once he managed to get the small golden band on Castiel’s hand.

The priest smiled widely at them and pronounced them husbands. When Dean pulled Castiel closer into a needy kiss, Castiel’s hands on his husband’s chest, the crowd was cheering and Sam had to get a tissue from his pocket to dry his eyes. He’d told himself not to cry, but here he was. He looked into to the rows and noticed that Bobby was already in tears, Crowley next to him shaking his head with a grin on his face. Not even those two grumpy old men could help being overjoyed right now.

After the ceremony, Sam had a second to pull his brother into a hug and congratulate him, and a moment later he did the same to Castiel. A lot of people rushed from their seats to the newly wed couple, so Sam decided to leave them for now and get back to Charlie who was already grinning widely at him.

They left the church after a while to get to the location where they wanted to celebrate. Dean and Castiel had booked a place with a live band and catering, big enough for all of them. Sam and Charlie even had their seats at the same table as the wedded couple, meaning that they had the wedding cake right in front of them. It looked amazing and definitely way too sweet with all the icing and it even had a little cake topper with two husbands in white suits.

“I’m glad everything went so smoothly,” Dean hummed as he ate his first piece of cake, smudging his lips with a bit of cream. Castiel leaned in to kiss it off, but today was their wedding so Sam allowed them to do something as sappy as that without protesting.

“I’m happy for you,” Sam replied with an honest smile. Weddings could be stressful and all the planning beforehand definitely was, but now that this part was over for the two they could look forward to their upcoming honeymoon vacation.

Castiel sighed, poking his fork into his own piece of cake. “I’m just glad it’s over. I was shaking the whole time during the ceremony and I thought I wouldn’t manage to say my vows.”

“It was awesome,” Dean said with a smirk and pecked a quick kiss to his husband’s lips, “Still fuzzy thinking about it.”

With an amused chuckle Castiel gave him a love drunk smile, his hand wandering to Dean’s thigh. It was apparent that they had only eyes for each other. “What do you say, wanna have the first dance of the evening?” he suggested.

“Aw, you know I can’t dance,” Dean laughed in response, “But I’d love to. C’mon, husband.”

Sam watched them get up and walk to dance floor, holding hands and giggling like teenagers. His heart felt heavy seeing them like that, glad that they were happy but at the same time knowing that he couldn’t dance with Gabriel on their wedding. That he couldn’t even tell them about the dreamwalker.

“You wanna dance with me instead?” Charlie asked, offering her hand to Sam. She gave him a soft, understanding smile. “Or would Gabriel be jealous?”

“Don’t think he would,” Sam laughed as he took Charlie’s hand into his own. She really was his best friend, always knowing what he needed.


	7. Chapter 7

By now Sam knew how to spot easily if he was dreaming. Usually it was the colour palette that tipped him off, whether it was pink grass or a lilac sky during daytime, or if the whole scene was tinted in a certain shade, like a filter over a movie flashback. Often the location wasn’t something he’d see in real life either, as he explored lush forests or the backs of giant animals in his dream. He would go to places he had never been to before or that couldn’t exist in reality, but they always were so much bigger and brighter than Sam’s normal life could ever be. 

Dreams simply felt different. There were some things that Sam was always aware of when he was awake, bills and responsibilities and all the stress that came with adult life, everything he was sick of. When he was asleep though, these things weren’t magically gone, but they manifested in more abstract ways that were hard to grasp properly. Sam could deal with his problems more easily if they were like that. Sometimes he went to bed with bad thoughts on his mind, but then he travelled through the world of his dreams, told Gabriel about it or saw them from a different angle. When he woke up later, he often felt a lot better, sometimes finding solutions that he could only come up with during a night full of healing sleep.

Sam loved both his lives. He liked his job and Amara finally gave him better cases, some that were seriously interesting. He usually spent lunch with Charlie or Castiel and on his weekends he went to Charlie’s place for movie night or Dean’s for family dinner. His brother and his husband even invited him to go out with their friends, and as Sam expected most of them were couples, but he still had fun. He didn’t feel like the third wheel he thought he would be and he even enjoyed being with Castiel’s brother Balthazar. He used to be annoying, but now Sam got along with him for some reason. Maybe it was just that Sam got older.

His second life was a lot more exciting though. When he was dreaming, Sam could go anywhere and be anything he wanted, and most importantly he could be together with Gabriel. Ever since Dean’s wedding Sam had thought about taking the next step, giving that all he ever did with Gabriel was cuddle and kiss, never anything more daring. In his real life it hadn’t been much more than two months since their first kiss and usually it wouldn’t be a big deal to take so long, but with as much time as Sam spent in his dreams their relationship was over a year old already and he was slowly getting impatient. It didn’t help that Gabriel often wore robes that revealed the delicious curves of his legs and that Sam couldn’t avoid staring.

Sam just wanted something… stable. Dean was married already and of course it was too soon to consider that with Gabriel, or whatever the dreamwalker equivalent of marriage was, but that didn’t mean that Sam needed no emotional reassurance, that he didn’t want his bond with Gabriel to be something they could call serious. Could there even be something like that? Something like a serious commitment between a human and a dreamwalker? Sam didn’t even know if Gabriel never visited the dreams of other people.

When he stepped through the golden gates of Jerusalem, Sam knew that he was dreaming. It wasn’t hard to tell, with the streets and buildings and even the light posts and signs made out of solid gold, everything glimmering in different shades of the precious metal. No, this couldn’t be a real location, but Sam still enjoyed exploring. His dreams always felt a little bit off, but it was mostly just like real life, at least for as long as he was asleep. Afterwards he often realised a lot of things that didn’t make sense, but during the dream Sam didn’t care.

The streets were buzzing with all kinds of people, most of them dressed in old-fashioned robes coloured in bright shades, similar to the ones Gabriel liked to wear sometimes. The thought of the dreamwalker made a smile appear on Sam’s lips as he walked through the city, knowing that he would find him soon. He couldn’t even remember when the last time had been that he had dreamed without seeing Gabriel.

Sam’s feet took him to the centre of the city that at the same time was strangely remote. It was in the exact middle, where all the golden streets lead together, but the crowd of people quickly thinned out and left Sam by himself. In the core of Jerusalem he found a giant temple, built out of marble and gold, decorated with satin banners dyed in Tyrian red. Gabriel’s aura filled the place, his energy pulsing through the air so strongly that it pulled Sam into the building.

As he walked through the giant marble doors, Sam suddenly found himself in a big throne room, the walls decorated with sumptuous tapestry and a battle scene painted over the high ceiling. He saw Gabriel sitting on the golden throne, dressed in a white robe and a red fur coat, his feet naked as he let his legs casually hang over the armrest, leaning against the other. He sent Sam his stupidly perfect smirk.

Gabriel smoothly slipped from the throne onto the stairs in front of the elevated platform it stood on and patted the thickly carpeted floor next to him, wordlessly telling his boyfriend to sit down. Sam chuckled and obeyed, getting to the ground to pull the dreamwalker into a soft kiss.

“Someone missed me,” Gabriel purred against Sam’s lips, his thumb stroking gently over his cheek. His eyes were flaring with that beautiful golden light Sam liked so much, giving him the appearance of the supernatural entity he truly was. If Sam could believe the stories in his book, dreamwalkers had more beastly true forms, but they usually showed themselves with a human appearance, at least if they didn’t want to scare the person they visited.

“So you didn’t miss me?” Sam chuckled, wrapping his arms tightly around his boyfriend. That he had been at the wedding without Gabriel was still on his mind, reminding him that what they had wasn’t exactly normal. Maybe it could never be normal with Gabriel being a dreamwalker.

Gabriel slipped his hand into Sam’s hair and caressed his scalp, softly guiding his fingertips over it. “Never said that, Sammy,” he replied with a loving smile, “I always miss you when you’re not around. I can’t control the time we spend in your dreams and things are bland when you’re gone.”

“Aw,” Sam laughed, his chest filling with a strange warmth that tasted like Gabriel’s smile, his golden eyes and his sunny aura. He couldn’t even tell how this feeling had a palpable taste, but this was a dream and things didn’t always make sense. They didn’t need to. “I’d come over more often, but I got a life and I can’t always be napping.”

Gabriel nodded slowly, but Sam could see the faint disappointment in his eyes. He wasn’t happy about it and neither was Sam. He wished they could spend more time together than they already did, but that wasn’t possible unfortunately. This easily tied into Sam’s desire to have something serious with Gabriel, a stable commitment that their situation didn’t allow. They would never have a white picket fence or children.

“What’s on your mind, Sammy?” Gabriel asked softly and cupped Sam’s jaw with his hand.

Sam shrugged. “Nothing really. Nothing important.”

Gabriel frowned, openly dissatisfied with his boyfriend’s answer. “You’re lying,” he stated flatly, his hand slipping back into Sam’s hair, “Remember, I’m in your head. I can feel your longing, Sammy. And I wanna know what I can do to help you. Because I love you, you know I do.”

“I love you too,” Sam sighed deeply, “But… Do you remember that I went to Dean’s wedding together with Charlie?”

“Yes, you told me. You didn’t enjoy it?” Gabriel asked.

“No, no. That’s not what I mean, it was great. It’s just… Well, Dean’s married now. And I, I want something stable, with you. It feels stupid that it’s so important to me, but I really do love you and I’d just… I want something more serious, you get what I mean? But I don’t even know if dreamwalkers have something like marriage.”

Gabriel listened carefully to what Sam had to say, wrinkling his brows in thought at first, but his face slowly lit up until he grinned a bright smile. He grabbed Sam’s hands tightly and chuckled. “Oh Sammy, you couldn’t make me any more happy! I wanted to ask you for so long already,” he told him excitedly, “I just didn’t know how you feel about this, but I want something serious too! I really, really want to bond with you.”

“Bond?” Sam asked with a smile. Seeing how well Gabriel responded to his concern only made him love the dreamwalker more.

“Well…” Gabriel drawled, “It’s not like marriage, what you humans do. It’s something a lot more deeper, more intimate.”

“Intimate?” Sam wanted to know, his curious hazel eyes fixed on his boyfriend, “How?”

“It binds our souls together,” Gabriel explained, “Which means that our feelings for each other become stronger. But you will also be able to feel me. It’s, uh… hard to explain, but it’s a good feeling.”

“And how do we do it?” Sam asked, excited about the process.

“It needs… physical confirmation.”

“You mean…”

“Sex,” Gabriel chuckled with a mischievous smirk on his pale lips. He let a hand wander to Sam’s leg, caressing his thigh slowly. “That’s why I didn’t take this any further with us. Because doing it would mean we’d immediately bond.”

“I’d like that,” Sam purred, his gaze falling to Gabriel’s fingers that were stroking gently over his leg.

“There’s a few things you gotta understand though,” Gabriel said suddenly a lot more sternly, “I’m a dreamwalker, Sam, and we have a few responsibilities. We are taking people in their sleep and that also gives us the choice to turn humans into dreamwalkers. How you could become one of us.”

Sam’s eyes went wide. What was Gabriel talking about all of a sudden? Taking people in their sleep? Killing them? “Wait, hold on a second,” Sam breathed out, shying away from Gabriel’s touch, “What do you mean by taking people in their sleep?”

Gabriel tilted his head. “I thought you’ve read the stories. That’s how I survive.”

“You what?” Sam huffed, quickly getting up from the ground, “You kill people? And you didn’t consider telling me?!”

Gabriel rose from the stairs of the throne room, his eyes flaring golden with confusion and a hint of irritation. “Sam, you’re misunderstanding this.”

“Am I? Did you visit me to kill me too?!” Sam asked, immediately regretting those words. Gabriel looked as if Sam had slapped him across his face, his eyes wide with a pain he didn’t expect.

The dreamwalker shivered, taking a deep breath. “Of course not,” he said, his voice heavy and controlled, “I’m just saying you could become a dreamwalker.”

“Gabe, I, I can’t,” Sam stammered, taking a step back. He suddenly understood the power Gabriel had, that he had always possessed. Sure, Sam had read about it, but he had thought those were just stories. He didn’t think his boyfriend was actually taking lives. Images of Charlie and Dean and Castiel flashed through Sam’s mind, made his legs weak, as he knew that he couldn’t lose them like this. “I don’t, I can’t become a dreamwalker like you! I, I have a real life.”

Gabriel stared at Sam for a moment of silence. His golden eyes showed a flurry of emotions, full of confusion, and Sam knew the dreamwalker was taken aback by something he had said. He could feel how hurt the dreamwalker was and immediately regretted doing this to the person he loved. He was just... so confused about all of this. 

“Ah, I get it,” Gabriel suddenly said, his voice so casual and nonchalant that it could only be fake, “Yeah, it’s fine, Sam. I can take a no. I get you got a _real_ life.” The dreamwalker put so much emphasis on the word that Sam realised he had made a mistake.

“I, I didn’t mean-“

“It’s fine!” Gabriel interrupted him, laughing. “I understand. Fuck, I’ve been so stupid…” he sighed, “This is just dreams to you. You don’t really give a shit, do you?”

“Of course I do!” Sam protested, stepping closer to his boyfriend to reach out to him, but Gabriel pulled away from his touch as if Sam’s fingertips would burn his skin.

“It’s fine, you don’t gotta pretend,” Gabriel presses through his teeth, “I’ll leave you to your real life now.”

Sam wanted to grasp the dreamwalker, tell him that this wasn’t what he meant, that he was just confused about the situation. That he loved him. But when Sam tried to touch him, all his hands found was his bedroom’s empty air. The dream was over.


	8. Chapter 8

Sam believed that it was just a fight, something that happened in every relationship sooner or later. Gabriel would calm down eventually and then they could talk about it. Sam knew he had made mistakes that night and said things he didn’t mean, but he didn’t think it would escalate like that. It seemed like they were ready to take that next step, but apparently they weren’t. 

Sam took the time to find out what Gabriel had been talking about that night. He read the book on dreamwalkers again, but this time more closely, paying attention to the parts about the dreamwalker’s ability to take people in their sleep. After skimming through the pages Sam quickly realised a strange connection: The cultures that believed in dreamwalkers as gods of death were also the ones that worshipped them the most highly, and Sam wondered why. He found the answer when he pierced the information written on the pages together to a bigger whole. Sam understood that the people who usually died in their sleep were the elderly and if he thought about how he would like to go, it was clear to him. Dying peacefully in your sleep at an old age, that was the perfect way to pass away for most people, so it only made sense that the dreamwalkers weren’t feared as dangerous grim reapers, but more as benevolent angels who guided you into your afterlife.

Implying that the dreamwalker had intentions to kill him must have hurt Gabriel more than Sam could imagine. Of course Gabriel didn’t, he had told him again and again that he loved him, and that was how Sam repaid it? If Gabriel wanted to, he could have killed Sam anytime according to the book. But he never did. Obviously he would never do that.

Once Gabriel came back to him, Sam would apologise as much as he could and ask him for forgiveness. The dreamwalker had just tried to explain a few things to Sam before they bonded and Sam had destroyed the moment with his irrational fear, turning something that could have been great into a disaster that left both of them sad and confused. Sam would make up for it when Gabriel was back. It would be all right.

But Gabriel didn’t come back.

Sam didn’t get any dreams anymore after the fight. The first week passed without Gabriel returning and slowly Sam became nervous. The dreamwalker hadn’t abandoned him, had he? He wouldn’t. They just had a fight, nothing that would break them apart forever. They could fix it, they just needed to talk.

But Gabriel didn’t return for another week. And then two weeks turned into a month, turned into two months, turned into three without him. Gabriel had left Sam. He wouldn’t be back and he had taken Sam’s dreams with him.

When Sam realised that his boyfriend wouldn’t return, that they were over with each other because of that fight, he felt like someone gripped his heart inside his ribcage and twisted it until the veins ripped apart and all his feelings broke through his lungs and bones and spilled an unbearable pain all over his insides. Gabriel wouldn’t be back. He had fucked up. He’d be alone again, missing the person he loved the most. 

Charlie did the best she could to cheer him up when Sam told her what had happened, invited him over more often now and as much as Sam loved her for it, she couldn’t heal the pain inside him. Around Dean and Castiel Sam never said anything about Gabriel since they didn’t even know he existed and although they realised something was wrong, Sam couldn’t bring himself to tell them what was going on. He just tried to be strong and not let them notice too much how broken he actually felt.

When he came home after an exhausting day of work, he knew that there was only an empty apartment waiting for him, a bed that wouldn’t bring him rest or dreams, and a big jar filled with golden feathers that Sam couldn’t throw out, no matter how much he told himself that he had to move on.

“You can’t keep doing this to yourself!” Charlie breathed out as she rushed into Sam’s office, slamming the mug of coffee down on the desk so hard that the liquid spilled over the edges and got on some of Sam’s paperwork. “Oh, fuck, sorry. I didn’t-”

Sam sighed. “It’s fine, it’s not important anyway,” he muttered, jiggling his mouse to click on his computer screen with no special intent.

“I’m serious, Sam,” Charlie said as she sat down on the free space on Sam’s desk, folding her arms in front of her chest. She blew out a breath to get a loose strand of hair out of her face, but it only made her look adorable.

“Serious about what?” Sam asked, giving her a tired look. He was absolutely exhausted. It took him forever to fall asleep at night and when he did, he didn’t rest well. Gabriel had been more of a help than he had realised before.

“About you,” Charlie replied with a vague gesture in his direction, “You’re still a downer because of Gabriel. It’s been over three months already.”

“I just need time,” Sam muttered, his gaze directed back to his computer screen.

“You don’t. You need to get over him,” Charlie said sternly, “So I got you a date.”

Sam slowly looked in her direction, raising his eyebrows. “You what?”

“Yeah,” Charlie huffed, “Friday night. My friend Ruby is going out with you.”

“Uhm…” Sam stared at his desk, taking a pen into his hands that was suddenly very interesting. Maybe a date wasn’t that bad. Maybe it would help. “I… I guess? It’s not a pity date though, is it?”

Charlie shook her head. “Ruby immediately asked when I told her you’re single again.”

Sam snorted, giving her an amused look. “You’re telling all your friends when I’m single? You’re a matchmaker now?”

“In my free time,” Charlie hummed with a smile, shrugging casually. She reached for a sticky note from Sam’s desk and quickly scribbled down a number, before she slapped the note onto the frame of the computer screen. “That’s her phone. You go and have fun and I want all the details later!”

Sam chuckled and nodded. “Fine. Thanks, Charlie.”

 

Sam waited in front of the restaurant where he agreed to meet Ruby. They had talked once over the phone and texted a little bit, and from all Sam could tell she seemed nice, but then again Charlie wouldn’t set him up for a date with some lunatic. He would have fun, if he could just bring himself to forget about Gabriel for one evening.

It took only a moment before he spotted Ruby’s car in the parking lot and when he watched her step out, he knew that Charlie had recommended a good one.

In the fear of overdressing he had decided to wear a plain red button-down and his suit pants, and now that he saw the restaurant he felt that it was the right choice, but Ruby’s short black cocktail dress looked absolutely stunning on her. Or maybe Sam just felt lonely, who knew?

“Hey Sam,” she said with a smile, flipping her beautiful dark hair over her shoulder, and reached out to wrap her arms around him for a hug. She wasn’t a small woman, but during the second she pressed herself against Sam’s giant frame she felt absolutely tiny in his arms. Sam chuckled.

“Hey,” he greeted her back, already optimistic about the date, “Wanna go in?”

The restaurant was nice, another recommendation from Charlie. Good for a date but definitely not too expensive, the staff seemed friendly and Sam and Ruby were led to a table by the window. The waiter took their order quickly and they didn’t have to wait long before their food finally arrived, and that was definitely a quality for a good restaurant.

“So, you wanna tell me something about yourself?” Sam asked as he filled both their glasses with the red wine they had ordered.

“Charlie didn’t tell you anything about me?” Ruby asked, watching Sam with an amused smile, “She told me a lot about you.”

“Unfair, I didn’t get the juicy details about you,” Sam hummed. His steak had a perfectly pink medium rare colour when he cut into it for the first time.

“Oh, she didn’t tell me as much as I wanted, believe me,” Ruby chuckled, inspecting her filet. “I went to college with Charlie, that’s how we know each other,” she said, “I’m a personal assistant. Does the name Lilith Boecher tell you anything?”

Sam faintly remembered her from the tabloids, the CEO of one of the successful startups of his town, if he recalled it right. “CEO? Of some company?”

Ruby nodded after she had taken a bite. “Boecher Enterprises. She inherited a lot of money so she put it to good use. And I’m her personal assistant, which is pretty much just a better secretary. But the job is fun and pays well.”

“You get along?” Sam asked, taking a sip of his wine. The alcohol was good and the food even better, he really had to thank Charlie when he saw her next time.

“Very. I’m more friend than employee to her. It’s visible on my paycheck,” Ruby replied, emptying half of her wine glass. “Charlie told me you’re a lawyer?”

“Yes, but the kind who does more paperwork than talk to actual clients,” Sam said, “And I’m not working in court, at least not if I can avoid it,“ he added with a chuckle.

Ruby seemed nice. The restaurant was perfect and the date went well. All things considered Sam was having a good time. Or at least, it should have been a good time for him, if his mind didn’t wander off to Gabriel so much, ask himself how many dreams he’d spent with the dreamwalker in restaurants, having dates just like this one. Maybe not exactly like this one, dreams were always more exciting. Sam missed that. He missed Gabriel. Ruby was great and she definitely was someone he could be with, but… This didn’t feel right. He still had feelings for Gabriel, so how could he date someone else? 

Sam filled their empty wine glasses, pretending that it was just good alcohol and that he didn’t want to drown out the thoughts about Gabriel. He had to move on. Talking to Ruby was fun, so why couldn’t he just focus on her?

Once Ruby had emptied her third glass, she suddenly fell silent. She had a strange, sad look in her eyes and Sam tried to remember if he had said something he shouldn’t. They were having fun with each other, just up until now.

“Everything all right, Ruby?” he asked carefully, leaning forward in his chair.

“Look, Sam,” she sighed, “I want to be honest with you. You’re a great guy, but…”

Sam raised an eyebrow. “But?”

“But…” Ruby inspected her nails during the moment she needed to collect her thoughts and folded her hands in front of her on the table before she looked up to Sam, “But I’m in love with Charlie.”

“Oh.”

“Don’t look at me like that now,” she protested.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to.” Sam cleared his throat, somehow a tiny bit grateful for this sudden turn. He didn’t feel like he could be a good partner for her as long as he still held onto Gabriel. “Why did you go out with me then?”

“I don’t know,” Ruby sighed, “When Charlie told me you’re single… You know, I don’t feel that she likes me in that way, so I thought going on a date with someone who’s nice would help me move on.”

“It’s fine,” Sam replied, pushing his fingers into his hair. “I… I feel kinda similar. I still got feelings for my ex and I don’t think that would be fair to you, if we saw each other more often but I still can’t let go of my past. But I think you should tell Charlie about your feelings.”

“Maybe I should,” Ruby said, “The thing is, I’m really confident around men.”

“I can see that,” Sam chuckled.

“Yes, but when it comes to women… Charlie… I don’t know. It’s different. I get nervous.”

“You? Nervous?” Sam laughed softly, “You don’t seem like the type.”

“I am with her. But you’re right, I should at least tell her.”

“Yes, you should,” Sam hummed, “You know her, she would be respectful about it even if she doesn’t feel the same. And who knows? Maybe she likes you back.”

Ruby gave him a thankful smile and nodded. “I wish. But I’ll try. And I hope you move on from your ex.”

“It’s kinda complicated,” Sam mumbled, picking up his fork, “We didn’t really break up. We just had a fight and now I haven’t seen him in three months.”

“Is that so?” Ruby asked, “I think you should confront him about it. Even if it’s over, you deserve a talk. A real breakup. It’s hard to move on if you don’t got that.”

“I wish it was that easy to just confront him,” Sam sighed. How would he even get to talk to him ever again? Gabriel didn’t want him.

“Good luck with it anyway,” Ruby replied, “And hey, Sam?”

“Yeah?”

“I think you’re a good guy, really. And… well, I think it’s hard to make new friends at our age, but would you like to hang out sometime? Just as friends, not for a date?”

Sam gave her a wide smile. He liked the idea. “Sure.”


	9. Chapter 9

Sam couldn’t call his date with Ruby a disaster. Of course they didn’t end up together, but he somehow felt better, knowing that instead of a partner he had gained a friend and that was a better solution for both of them. Ruby was a good person and Sam truly hoped that Charlie would give her a chance. 

He knew that he hadn’t moved on yet and he still thought about Gabriel every day, but the things Ruby had said still concerned him. Could he really get over it if Gabriel hadn’t properly broken up with him? The problem was that Gabriel just wasn’t a normal human with an address where Sam could go and demand that they talk to each other. If the dreamwalker didn’t visit him, how would Sam find him? Was that even possible? 

Sam still had so many things to get out, but more importantly he wanted to apologise for everything he had said that night. Gabriel deserved a proper apology and if he still didn’t want to see Sam ever again, he would be fine with it. He would finally be able to move on.

There had to be a way to find Gabriel, at least Sam hoped there was. If he could find out somehow, it would surely be written down in his book on dreamwalkers. Sam hadn’t picked it up ever since he realised Gabriel wouldn’t come back, simply because it hurt too much to be reminded of him. Now it was time to look into it again. 

Sam faintly remembered something about rituals to meet a dreamwalker, but would that help him? What if he found someone who wasn’t Gabriel? A dreamwalker that had control over his dreams and consequently his life? The possibilities almost overwhelmed him, but the chance to confront Gabriel convinced him to at least try and find a way. 

Sitting on his couch, wrapped in a soft blanket, Sam flipped through the pages under the faint evening light as he marked all the parts that contained detailed descriptions of summoning rituals. He hadn’t paid close attention to those so far since they were mostly just lists of things you had to do, not knowing that he would need them, but now they were all the more important. Surprisingly enough the book spoke of many different ways to summon a dreamwalker, but with the amount there was, Sam didn’t even know what to do. They couldn’t all work, could they?

The one that caught his eye needed an ingredient that was familiar to Sam - a dreamwalker’s feather. Given that those definitely existed and Sam had a whole jar filled with them, this one could possibly be a real ritual. And he even had everything available to perform it. Should he try right away? Or should he wait and think this through?

Sam shifted on the couch and stood up, the blanket wrapped securely around his shoulders as he walked into the kitchen, his legs shaking. He knew exactly that he couldn’t wait any longer, not with the chance to see Gabriel again. He had to try.

Placing the book on the counter he read through the list of ingredients and went to take bay leaves and salt from his spice drawer. Once he had put those down next to the book, he filled a wine glass with water - the pages said “chalice”, but Sam assumed that the glass would be sufficient. The ritual wanted him to use a metal bowl made of something like gold or silver, but it also insisted that the material wasn’t important, it just had to shine properly, so Sam emptied his fruit bowl and hoped that aluminium would work if he polished it with his kitchen towel.

With all of that in his hands, the book tucked under his arm, Sam went into his bedroom, opening the door with his elbow. After he carefully situated everything on the ground and searched the drawers of his bedside cabinet for a lighter, he took the jar with the feathers to sit back down on the floor. 

Sam made himself comfortable on his carpet, but his heart was thrashing in his chest. He had to remind himself to breathe, internalise that this didn’t have to work and he shouldn’t be too disappointed if it didn’t. This could be just another made up thing and Sam had to understand that no matter how much he wanted this, maybe he wouldn’t see Gabriel. Maybe he would never meet the dreamwalker again.

Sam reached for the salt and poured a good handful into the bowl, adding a few bay leaves. He knew that salt wasn’t flammable, but the leaves quickly caught on fire when Sam held his lighter against them, burning down to ash on top of the little white mountain. Now he had to work with the most important component: the feather of a dreamwalker. The book advised to pick it up by its shaft and hold it up so the ash would sprinkle all over the other ingredients. Sam did exactly that, careful not to hurt his fingers while he watched the feather glow in a blinding golden light, black remains floating down into the bowl.

For a moment Sam watched the mixture smoulder, glowing faintly until every flame was gone. Now he had to wait until it got cold, but Sam didn’t want the time to think. He knew that all of this was crazy, that it didn’t seem like anything real. How would he be able to summon Gabriel with stuff he got from his kitchen? That was impossible. But then again, meeting a dreamwalker was impossible as well, and Gabriel definitely existed without a doubt. So why question this too much?

Once the ashes had cooled down, Sam poked his fingers into the little pile and began to mix it together. The book asked him not to use any tools to do this, that it would work best if he just did it by hand. Having the ashes and the salt blended into a grainy powder, Sam filled it into his cupped palm and threw it into the glass of water, stirring with his finger until he had a muddy black liquid.

The next part made Sam reconsider if he really wanted to do this, fearing that he could possibly poison himself, but it was for Gabriel, so he knew that he would do it either way. If he wanted to apologise, he had to get through with this. Shifting to sit in front of the mirror on the door of his wardrobe, Sam dipped a finger into the black water and began to draw a sigil on his forehead, just like the book depicted it. He looked into the glass, inhaled deeply, and drank everything that was left. Grimacing at the terrible taste, Sam swallowed, but some of it stuck to his tongue like glue, leaving a salty and bitter aftertaste. 

Sam wiped his hand on his sweatpants, leaving a big black stain. Whatever, he could always wash that later. Now he had to sleep and hope that he would find Gabriel. He already felt dizzy, blinking a few times to clear his vision, before he crawled into his bed. He didn’t even bother to pull his blanket over himself, falling asleep in a heartbeat.

 

He had to squint for a moment before his eyes adjusted to the dim light conditions of the cave he had appeared in. The whole scene was wrapped in a mossy stench that was unmistakably made from the same fabric as all his dreams were, the solid stone walls glistening with a moist sheen of condensation, covered in fluorescent letters of a language Sam didn’t know.

Good. He was asleep, dreaming for the first time in months, meaning that maybe the ritual had worked and all he had to do was find the dreamwalker. Sam didn’t have many choices as the natural corridor only led into the two opposite directions, so he decided to follow the writings on the walls. The further he walked the better he managed to see, making out faintly glowing mushrooms and strange kinds of moss that grew on the ground and up the walls. It was beautiful, but Sam felt unable to concentrate on the dream flora, given that he had a specific goal in mind. He had to find Gabriel.

After a few minutes he realised that the dreamwalker was definitely present, his aura wafting in Sam’s direction, pulling him closer with intensity. Even when the cave branched off, Sam knew exactly where to go. Gabriel was calling out to him, even if just with his energy.

Sam wanted this. It was exactly why he came here, but suddenly a petrifying nervousness creeped up his neck, slowing his step as he tried to swallow against the tightness in his throat. What if Gabriel didn’t want to hear his apology? What if he just made him wake up, what if he was angry? Sam didn’t even properly think through what he wanted to say and now he became painfully aware of how unprepared he was for this confrontation. 

Before he could freak out and turn around though, he already found something blocking his way. Not something, a creature. A huge being of only feathers and eyes, curled together and breathing slowly. Sam froze.

“Gabriel?” he whispered, the dreamwalker’s strong energy pulsating through the cool air of the cave.

The creature shivered in front of him, its eyes closing tightly. Was this the dreamwalker’s true form, what he looked like when he wasn’t prepared for Sam’s visit? He looked terrifying, not like anything from this world, and Sam understood why Gabriel wouldn’t show him earlier. His shape was incomprehensible, shifting in size when Sam wasn’t looking at the edges.

Sam swallowed and reached out slowly, his shaking hand touching the feathers, diving into them as if he tried to caress a bird’s soft wing. “Gabriel, talk to me.”

The creature slowly lost its shape under Sam’s touch, first growing and squeezing into the walls of the cave before it shrunk down to a smaller size, eyes opening and closing until they melted into the body and finally disappeared. After a minute the dreamwalker found an almost human shape, the feathers dissolving to give way for skin. Suddenly Sam saw Gabriel sitting before him, some spots of his body covered in feathers where his robe would be, if he’d been wearing it. He didn’t look up.

“You shouldn’t have come here,” Gabriel said quietly when Sam sat down in front of him. His golden eyes were full of sorrow as they met Sam’s gaze for the first time in months. 

“I needed to talk to you,” Sam replied softly, fighting the urge to pull his dreamwalker into a tight hug to stifle the painful sting in his chest. He knew Gabriel felt similar, his heavy aura still drenching the air.

“I didn’t want you to see me like that, Sammy,” Gabriel sighed, “My true form isn’t meant for humans. You gotta be terrified.”

“A bit,” Sam admitted, offering a smile, “But I… I had to find you. I still have so many things to tell you.”

“Do you, Sam?” Gabriel asked as he looked away with his golden eyes, “I think you’ve said everything important. You don’t… You don’t want someone like me. I’m a monster. You’ve just seen for yourself.”

Sam couldn’t hold himself back when he reached out for Gabriel’s hand, wrapping his fingers around it tightly. “You’re not,” he protested, “I was wrong, I freaked out because I didn’t understand what you were talking about. I understand now and I… I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you, Gabe.”

“You have a real life,” Gabriel sighed, his skin hungry for Sam’s touch.

“And you’re part of that,” Sam replied sternly, “So please, forgive me for being so stupid. I still need you. I still want to bond with you.”

Gabriel looked up, disbelief shining in his eyes. “You do?”

Sam nodded. “Yes. If you can forgive me.”

When Gabriel gave him a soft smile, Sam pulled him into his arms, needing the dreamwalker’s touch more than anything. They had been separated for too long and now Gabriel was so close that Sam couldn’t help himself.

Gabriel chuckled softly, melting against Sam’s chest. “You’re just awful, you know that?”

“Am I?” Sam asked, breathing out in relief. He understood that Gabriel had already forgiven him, since the dreamwalker was pressed so close to him that his aura wrapped around both of their bodies. The invisible cloud of energy pulsated in a calm rhythm, like the dreamwalker’s equivalent of a heartbeat. Sam felt at ease for the first time since Gabriel had left him.

“Yeah,” Gabriel muttered, “You really are. You freaked out so much when I tried to explain everything that… that I thought you didn’t want to see me ever again. That you’re afraid of me.”

Sam shook his head, caressing Gabriel’s side to reassure him that this wasn’t the case. “I’m not. I didn’t know you could take lives, but the book explained it and I understand now.”

“Does that mean you’d like to become a dreamwalker? Like me?” Gabriel asked. Sam swallowed, knowing that he couldn’t give him what he wanted.

“No…” Sam mumbled, “I, I can’t just leave Dean and Cas and Charlie… I’m not ready for that.”

Gabriel reached out to cup Sam’s cheek with him palm, carefully brushing his thumb over the skin. “It’s fine, Sammy. Calm down. I never should’ve asked you that in the first place, I know that’s too big of a decision.”

“It doesn’t mean I never will!” Sam interrupted, “Maybe, maybe-”

“Shh, Sammy. It’s okay. There’s still so much time and it’s okay if you never want that, ever. I’m fine with that. I… I just love you and I still want to bond with you.”

Sam smiled softly, nodding. “I love you too, Gabe. And I want that too.”

Gabriel leaned in and pressed a kiss to his lips, his hands sliding into Sam’s hair to pull him closer. Sam wrapped his arms tightly around the dreamwalker, accepting his touch, his warmth, his scent, breathing out slowly once he realised properly that Gabriel was his again. He had missed this so, so much. 

Once they managed to break apart, Gabriel gave him a devilish smirk, twisting one of Sam’s hair strands between his fingers. “How about we take this somewhere more comfortable then, huh Sammy?” 

Sam liked the idea.


End file.
